Weapons Of The Rich. Strategic Action Of Private Entrepreneurs In Contemporary China. Thomas Heberer

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СКАЧАТЬ increasingly significant for local development and positive cadre evaluation over the years, entailing a relationship of mutual dependence between local governments and private entrepreneurs that has shaped state–business relations since the beginning of private sector development in the 1980s. As we have argued elsewhere (Schubert and Heberer, 2015), this relationship gradually changed throughout the Hu–Wen era and the early years of the Xi Jinping administration, when the local state was ordered to scale back its developmentalist and entrepreneurialist activities and become more of a regulator — a shift of function from immediate ‘leadership’ (lingdao) to ‘guidance’ (yindao) and mere service provision (fuwu).³²

       The Private Sector in the Xi Jinping Era

      In his report to the 18th Party Congress in 2012, the outgoing CCP general secretary Hu Jintao explicitly mentioned the private sector only twice by postulating that private financial institutions and private hospitals should be rapidly developed (Hu Jintao, 2012). Also, in 2013, the CCP’s Central Committee decision on further deepening reforms, thus setting out Xi Jinping’s comprehensive policy agenda for China’s future, addressed the private sector only marginally.³³ Rather, it emphasized the party state’s intention to facilitate private investment in SOEs and better access for private entrepreneurs to markets so far controlled by SOEs, but the overall impression from the document text was that the party leaders, most importantly Xi himself, had second thoughts about the government’s former commitment to more leeway for the private sector. Many private entrepreneurs were alarmed. This compelled party leaders, most notably Xi Jinping himself, to reassure private entrepreneurs that their worries were groundless and the regime ready to further support and develop the private sector.³⁴

      In fact, between 2012 and 2018, no important policies targeting the private sector were launched, though the Chinese leadership concerned themselves with reassuring private entrepreneurs that this sector would still be supported politically and that it was crucial for China’s further development and innovation drive.³⁵ Hence, private sector policies were addressed in very general terms concerning content. It seems as though, during this period, the party leadership foremost intended to clarify the future role of the private sector for China’s further economic transformation and its relationship with the state-owned sector before any new policies were defined. As such, in the following paragraphs, we focus on a discursive level to pinpoint the party state’s stance on private sector development.

      When Xi Jinping came to power in 2012, he called for greater efforts to incorporate private entrepreneurs into the political system. In May 2016, he sought to strengthen party work within the ‘new social classes’ (xin shehui jieceng),³⁶ particularly among young entrepreneurs in the private sector, people returning to China after studying abroad, and professionals working in the new media. He demanded that these new classes should be represented in organizations such as the CCP and other political parties, in People’s Congresses (PCs), People’s Political Consultative Conferences (PPCCs), etc.³⁷ In September 2016, Yu Zhengsheng, while on an inspection tour in Tianjin as a member of the CCP’s Politburo Standing Committee and Chairman of the National PPCC, declared that people of the ‘new social strata’, particularly entrepreneurs in the nonpublic economic sectors, should be fully respected, and party state authorities should help them to ‘unite around the CCP and the government’ (Yu Zhengsheng, 2016). The United Front Departments (tongzhanbu) of the CCP were called upon to take care of this new social segment and offer training courses to bring private entrepreneurs closer to the party and strengthen their entrepreneurial and ‘patriotic’ spirit,³⁸ a task which had already been written into the Charter of the CCP United Front Department in 2015.³⁹ A national conference of leading ‘United Front’ cadres held in early 2018 again supported the decision to reinforce party work within these ‘new social classes’.⁴⁰

      In the context of the anti-corruption campaign initiated in 2014 China’s political leadership also targeted private entrepreneurs. Many of them were involved in major corruption cases. Interestingly, in autumn 2016 Renmin Ribao published an article on the private sector calling for a ‘new relationship’ between private entrepreneurs and leading cadres in order to combat corruption. Such a statement had originally been made by Xi Jinping during a meeting of entrepreneurial delegates to the National PPCC in March of that year. Xi emphasized that the government–business relations (zhengshang guanxi) should be ‘intimate’ (qin) and ‘clean’ (qing), meaning just and honest. He called on both government officials and entrepreneurs to create a new atmosphere of cooperative relations in which corrupt practices, exchange of power and money, as well as predatory behavior on the part of cadres and entrepreneurs had no place. Although governments at all levels and entrepreneurs should keep a distance from each other, the former should treat private enterprises like relatives, frequently communicate with them, take care of them, and support them in solving problems. Entrepreneurs in turn should contribute to local development and refrain from corrupt and illegitimate practices (Zou, 2016). In his report to the 19th National Congress of the CCP, Xi Jinping reiterated that constructing new qin and qing relations between politics and business would be the right way to create a ‘healthy’ private economy and sound entrepreneurship (Xi Jinping, 2017). Interestingly, a provincial party publication emphasized that the core responsibility to accomplish this objective was on the side of the government, not on the side of private entrepreneurs (Xia, 2018).

      For his part, Premier Li Keqiang underscored in his work report presented at the annual session of the National PC in 2016 the Chinese government’s intention to resolutely promote private sector development.⁴¹ Li had emphasized several times before that ‘mass entrepreneurship’ and ‘entrepreneurial innovation’ (dazhong chuangye, wanzhong chuangxin) would be fostered in order to achieve China’s ambitious development goals.⁴² In fact, judging by numerous official statements made by the Premier in recent years, China’s private entrepreneurs are conceived of as a crucial force for initiating and maintaining a process of continuous technological innovation, an important precondition of China becoming a globally competitive economy (Li Keqiang, 2017).⁴³

      In September 2017, shortly before the 19th Party Congress of the CCP, a joint statement issued by the CCP’s Central Committee and the State Council reemphasized the state’s willingness to put new policies on track to assist private entrepreneurs and protect their legal rights. The new policies sought to ensure that their innovative capacity, patriotism, and ‘entrepreneurial spirit’ (qiyejia jingshen)⁴⁴ be further developed, and that they consistently act in the interest of the nation, their businesses, and their employees.⁴⁵ Private entrepreneurs were expected to advance patriotism and professionalism, as well as innovation and social responsibility (Zhonggong Zhongyang Guowuyuan, 2017). Official documents like this one have repeatedly reiterated the party state’s invocation of private entrepreneurs as both loyal regime supporters and an innovating force bearing a major responsibility for China’s modernizing program until 2050.

      Interestingly, Xi Jinping’s report to the 19th National Party Congress of the CCP in October 2017, however, addressed the private sector only marginally. He emphasized that its development should be supported (zhichi fazhan) and guided (yindao) and that the ‘entrepreneurial spirit’ should be further promoted and protected (Xi, 2017). The same holds true for the Working Report of the Government at the 2018 session of the National People’s Congress, delivered by Prime Minister Li Keqiang, which only mentioned the government’s intention to ‘solve the crucial problems of private enterprises’ (Li Keqiang, 2018). Nevertheless, even these limited references to the private sector induced the All-China Federation of Industry and Commerce (ACFIC/Gongshanglian) and its local branches to proclaim the implementation of new private sector policies.⁴⁶ To what extent these initiatives will translate into the implementation of concrete policies over the coming years remains to be seen, but party and government leaders have made it very clear that China’s future depends on the success of its private entrepreneurs in an increasingly competitive global economy.

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